Official Merchandiser Announced for 2023 Double Decker Arts Festival

For the first time in its history, the Double Decker Arts Festival will have an official merchandiser that will produce and sell all of its merchandise prior to and during the two-day festival.

In its 26th year, the Double Decker Arts Festival will take place April 28-29, on the historic downtown Oxford Square.

In past years, the festival organizers took bids for the production of merchandise and sold products directly to consumers. While this process has worked in the past, the 2022 Double Decker Arts Festival saw a busier-than-ever merchandise stand during the festival, as well as for online orders prior to and after the festival.

With a small staff trying to fulfill the orders, organizers and Oxford Tourism Council board members believed there was a better way to handle sales.

“After doing some research, we noticed that many festivals do collaborate with an official merchandiser who handles all of those tasks: production, inventory, sales, shipping and everything else that goes into it,” said Oxford Tourism Council board member, Brooke Harris. “While this has never been done with Double Decker, we believe it’s a model that can work and be more beneficial for all involved. We are calling this a test run to see if it can live up to the potential that we believe it has.”

After sending out an RFP to all T-shirt vendors, the selected merchandiser for the 2023 Double Decker Art Festival is local storefront, B-Unlimited. According to the agreement, B-Unlimited will handle all online orders, as well as staffing the merchandise tent on the festival grounds.

Additionally, an advantage to having a merchandiser, if one item is more popular, B-Unlimited has the capacity to print more and have it available quickly.

“We are excited to try this collaboration. We will still offer all of the merchandise that everyone has grown to love including the official Double Decker poster, the artwork T-shirt with music lineup, and kid and adult T-shirts, but we will now be able to offer more options that we think everyone will love,” said Lee Ann Stubbs, coordinator for the Double Decker Art Festival.

“Offering additional outlets to get the Double Decker Arts Festival and Oxford brand to more people through online, social media, in-store, and festival sales creates a broader reach. We look forward to seeing how this test run works,” said Kinney Ferris, Executive Director of Visit Oxford.

The 2023 festival merchandise will be available to view and purchase on Thursday in the B-Unlimited Oxford store on the Square, doubledeckerfestival.com or shop.b-unlimited.com.

Online purchases may be picked up at B-Unlimited or shipped.

Courtesy of Visit Oxford